How long did Thomas know?

[Second Aristh]

Let's not forget it was at Lara's insistence that Harry take Justine to the island with Mab backing her on that insistence that Harry was on the boat with her in the first place.  If Harry hadn't napped and started to run things together and add things together, Nemesis would have gotten inside the island defenses..  So clever Lara didn't think anything was wrong with Justine, felt she owed her.. And if Mab couldn't figure it out, who could?  No, I think the object was to get past the defenses, which Justine/He Who Walks Beside would have if Harry hadn't smelled a rat... From there it would have been a small matter of releasing monsters, the like of the world hadn't seen in a millennia, that wasn't just to kill time.

Call Harry stashing Thomas on Demonreach a bit of a gift, don't think that was predictable, don't think they expected him to survive the plot.  However once that happened and the battle of Chicago was lost, Nemesis is smart enough to take advantage of that gift.  So Justine play victim and lover of Thomas whined enough so that Lara with Mab's backing got Harry to take her to the island.  If it had succeeded it would have indeed snatched victory from the jaws of defeat..

We agree that Nemesis wanted inside Demonreach once it was clear that Thomas was there, but it's a big leap from sending Thomas on an assassination to getting inside the island's defenses.  It wasn't a given that Thomas would end up there, and Nemesis gave up a well placed agent on the off chance to have the opportunity.  It makes it seem like there may have been another goal in mind before the Demonreach gambit presented itself.  Tying up Harry's time is plausible like Harry mentioned, but to what end?

[Mira]

We agree that Nemesis wanted inside Demonreach once it was clear that Thomas was there, but it's a big leap from sending Thomas on an assassination to getting inside the island's defenses.  It wasn't a given that Thomas would end up there, and Nemesis gave up a well placed agent on the off chance to have the opportunity.  It makes it seem like there may have been another goal in mind before the Demonreach gambit presented itself.  Tying up Harry's time is plausible like Harry mentioned, but to what end?

Did Nemesis give up that agent?  Unless Justine turns up somewhere no longer infected or dead, she is still out there.  Oh they want the prison population alright, the frontal attack in Cold Days didn't work, they managed to get an agent inside, Maeve, Harry didn't have working knowledge of the island's defenses yet, but they failed.  Oh I think it was predictable to a degree, that if Thomas survived the assassination attempt, Lara would want to free her brother, Harry would want to free his brother.. If Lara had her way, she would have hauled him off to the estate and fed him up even if it took a thousand vanilla humans dying in the process to do that.  Harry also as a member at a critical time had only one alternative, put Thomas in prison on the island, that is the only solution that would satisfy everyone.  Poor Justine, of course she'd want to see her lover, another in to the prison.

[morriswalters]

The answer to this lies in Bombshells. Thomas at the center of two plots is too much. So call it one. So at least since Bomb Shell's.  With Etrie out of the way who would have got his throne? Ever since Grave Peril one or the other of the power centers have been under attack by Nemesis in an attempt to breach the defenses of reality.  Why is this any different? First Summer then Winter,  the White's and so on.

[Mira]

The answer to this lies in Bombshells. Thomas at the center of two plots is too much. So call it one. So at least since Bomb Shell's.  With Etrie out of the way who would have got his throne? Ever since Grave Peril one or the other of the power centers have been under attack by Nemesis in an attempt to breach the defenses of reality.  Why is this any different? First Summer then Winter,  the White's and so on.

Yes, the point is Nemesis doesn't want to fight a united front.  So it looks for weaknesses, Thomas might be at the center of two of them because of who he is, who he is related to, and what he is trying to do, that makes him easy to use.  Now if he had continued with his full blown vamp attitude that he had at the end of Turn Coat, humans are simply kine for him to feed upon, he would no longer present a weakness to exploit.  Ask yourself why was he feeding on Etrie's sister?  Because he gets fed and the elves apparently can tolerate it very well, which gave Nemesis a in for disrupting by way of assassination the Accords at a critical moment.  They got an in in the Winter Court because Lea felt dissatisfaction with her role, she felt that with getting the Knife she'd gain power and more influence with Mab.  Which in turn opened the way to Maeve who was really screwed up to begin with, Mab was able to cure Lea, but it was all over for Maeve.

[Basil]

We agree that Nemesis wanted inside Demonreach once it was clear that Thomas was there, but it's a big leap from sending Thomas on an assassination to getting inside the island's defenses.  It wasn't a given that Thomas would end up there, and Nemesis gave up a well placed agent on the off chance to have the opportunity.  It makes it seem like there may have been another goal in mind before the Demonreach gambit presented itself.  Tying up Harry's time is plausible like Harry mentioned, but to what end?

I don't think it's a given that Thomas would end up a prisoner inside Demonreach, but I think it's a near certainty that Thomas would given sanctuary on the island itself -- even if Thomas had not been captured by the Svartelves. 

Harry and Lara have access to exactly one place that they could stash someone, in perpetuity, and be assured that the Svartelves couldn't grab him. 

[Mira]

I don't think it's a given that Thomas would end up a prisoner inside Demonreach, but I think it's a near certainty that Thomas would given sanctuary on the island itself -- even if Thomas had not been captured by the Svartelves. 

Harry and Lara have access to exactly one place that they could stash someone, in perpetuity, and be assured that the Svartelves couldn't grab him.

Harry does certainly, however I doubt that Lara does.

[Snark Knight]

This, I think in retrospect, was supposed to be a clue for Harry.  Harry was supposed to realize that someone used the baby as leverage, and so Harry was supposed to then figure out who knew that Justine was pregnant.  This is a small pool of people that probably only included Lara and Justine.  Lara can be immediately ruled out because of all the trouble this has caused the White Court, leaving us with ... Justine as the only suspect.  As Holmes says, "Once you've ruled out the impossible then whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truth."

Pretty weak clue. A lot of us thought in between PT and BG that the hit was the price of making a deal with something powerful to make sure the baby didn't kill Justine. Which was sort of a 'well, yes, but actually no' situation. Lampshading the inherent danger of carrying a whampire baby and saying he had a plan for that ended up being a distraction from the much more immediate threat that Nemesis could just make Justine jump out a window or something if Thomas didn't play ball.

[Mira]

Pretty weak clue. A lot of us thought in between PT and BG that the hit was the price of making a deal with something powerful to make sure the baby didn't kill Justine. Which was sort of a 'well, yes, but actually no' situation. Lampshading the inherent danger of carrying a whampire baby and saying he had a plan for that ended up being a distraction from the much more immediate threat that Nemesis could just make Justine jump out a window or something if Thomas didn't play ball.

Yeah, not a clue at all, really. All that Thomas said was the baby/hunger could kill Justine.. That's a threat from inside her belly, just what was Harry going to combat that outside of suggesting an abortion?

[Second Aristh]

I don't think it's a given that Thomas would end up a prisoner inside Demonreach, but I think it's a near certainty that Thomas would given sanctuary on the island itself -- even if Thomas had not been captured by the Svartelves. 

Harry and Lara have access to exactly one place that they could stash someone, in perpetuity, and be assured that the Svartelves couldn't grab him.

Yeah, I don't think it was a given that Thomas would end up a prisoner under Demonreach either.  If he was just staying on the island, Justine wouldn't need to be let into the island's defenses (at least no further than she'd already been).  They can chat on the Whatssup Dock and avoid the worst of the island's creepy vibe.  Lara probably has safehouses that the svartalves don't know about too.

The fact that the opportunity to get Justine past Demonreach's defenses wasn't too likely to occur points to an alternative main goal and the Demonreach ploy being a last minute change of plans hoping to get lucky since Justine's cover was going to be blown soon anyway.  So what was the original goal of sending Thomas to assassinate Etri?  I see two main consequences of initiating the assassination with Justine:  (1) small temporary disruption of the Accords, but the peace talks were already going to be majorly disrupted anyway, and (2) it tied Harry's time up completely before Ethniu got there.

Consequence (2) seems most likely for Nemesis, and it synergizes with the distraction that the White Council vote.  That begs the question, what was the thing that Harry was being distracted from?

Did Nemesis give up that agent?  Unless Justine turns up somewhere no longer infected or dead, she is still out there.  Oh they want the prison population alright, the frontal attack in Cold Days didn't work, they managed to get an agent inside, Maeve, Harry didn't have working knowledge of the island's defenses yet, but they failed.  Oh I think it was predictable to a degree, that if Thomas survived the assassination attempt, Lara would want to free her brother, Harry would want to free his brother.. If Lara had her way, she would have hauled him off to the estate and fed him up even if it took a thousand vanilla humans dying in the process to do that.  Harry also as a member at a critical time had only one alternative, put Thomas in prison on the island, that is the only solution that would satisfy everyone.  Poor Justine, of course she'd want to see her lover, another in to the prison.

Now that Harry knows Justine has been taken, Justine can't do anything active to help Nemesis.  At best, she's a hostage instead of a well placed spy that can act in Nemesis's interests.  Nemesis gave those options up when it sent Thomas on the assassination.

[Basil]

Justine can still do a great deal of harm.  Who knows what secrets she had access to as Lara's Privy Secretary.  Granted, some of that information will eventually go stale, but there will be more damage to the White Court for certain.

One easy example: Justine/Nemesis knows that Lord Raith is a drooling moron.  That is not public knowledge, but suspected by some. 

Another easy example:  Justine's "betrayal" of Lara demonstrates Lara's relative incompetence at scheming, justifying (more) plots to depose her.  Yes, many of her serious enemies died during Blood Rites and Turn Cloak, but many remain, certainly. 

[Second Aristh]

Justine can still do a great deal of harm.  Who knows what secrets she had access to as Lara's Privy Secretary.  Granted, some of that information will eventually go stale, but there will be more damage to the White Court for certain.

One easy example: Justine/Nemesis knows that Lord Raith is a drooling moron.  That is not public knowledge, but suspected by some. 

Another easy example:  Justine's "betrayal" of Lara demonstrates Lara's relative incompetence at scheming, justifying (more) plots to depose her.  Yes, many of her serious enemies died during Blood Rites and Turn Cloak, but many remain, certainly.

I'd imagine any secrets would very quickly go stale.  Moving safe houses and the like.  Swapping security protocols in the Raith estates.

After this long, I think Lara being the White Queen is an all but open secret (especially to the people that play the information game like the White Court).  She's pretty well solidified her power base beneath her in WN (finishing up in TC) and has been expanding White Court power politically through the mortal world (remember the navy cruiser in Changes?).  You don't move like that if there's a real threat of your base of power being ripped from under you.  Losing Justine is a hit to her, but I don't think it'll make other whampires think it is time to take a shot at her.  If anything, I think losing Justine would be an emotional toll instead of a political one.  Lara probably doesn't have that many close friends, tbh.

[Mira]

Now that Harry knows Justine has been taken, Justine can't do anything active to help Nemesis.  At best, she's a hostage instead of a well placed spy that can act in Nemesis's interests.  Nemesis gave those options up when it sent Thomas on the assassination.

I doubt that Justine is a hostage, at least at this point anyway, because so far no demands are being made for her freedom. 

  I think Nemesis counted on Thomas being killed in the act and Justine playing the grieving lover and mother of his child.. Thus getting herself even more deeply embedded into Lara's inner circle and in closer contact with her associates, and perhaps access to Vadderung.  Remember until Harry forced the issue, no one had any clue that Justine was possessed.

[Second Aristh]

I doubt that Justine is a hostage, at least at this point anyway, because so far no demands are being made for her freedom. 

  I think Nemesis counted on Thomas being killed in the act and Justine playing the grieving lover and mother of his child.. Thus getting herself even more deeply embedded into Lara's inner circle and in closer contact with her associates, and perhaps access to Vadderung.  Remember until Harry forced the issue, no one had any clue that Justine was possessed.

Hostage in the sense that Nem!Justine can tell Harry, "Back off or I will kill this vessel" type scenario, but true for the ransom note.  It's a card that Nemesis could play against Harry, but not many others.

Even with Thomas being killed in the act, I think Harry would have been suspicious of what motivated him to attempt it.  With time to think, that road almost certainly leads to Justine again anyway.  It is exactly what an exhausted Harry came to the conclusion of once he had a bit of breathing room post-Ethniu.  I think there may be more to the motivation puzzle we don't see yet.

[Mira]

Hostage in the sense that Nem!Justine can tell Harry, "Back off or I will kill this vessel" type scenario, but true for the ransom note.  It's a card that Nemesis could play against Harry, but not many others.

But so far not played, leaving a Walker tied up in a pregnant woman's body.

Even with Thomas being killed in the act, I think Harry would have been suspicious of what motivated him to attempt it.  With time to think, that road almost certainly leads to Justine again anyway.  It is exactly what an exhausted Harry came to the conclusion of once he had a bit of breathing room post-Ethniu.  I think there may be more to the motivation puzzle we don't see yet.

Of course he would have been suspicious of what motivated Thomas, but he had no time for an investigation.  Lara would have insisted on that had they all survived the attack.  I don't think the bread crumbs would lead all that easily back to Justine.. She'd also have time to get her act together and Lara would have been even more protective of her, remember she never saw through her. 

[Second Aristh]

But so far not played, leaving a Walker tied up in a pregnant woman's body.

If the assumption is that Nemesis can't hop back and forth among several.  My guess is 13 bodies based on the cornerhounds and the number keeping on popping up in other contexts, but that's only a guess. 

It would tie up at least one of the slots that Nemesis might hop into at a given time, though.  Depending on its options, that might be worth it to eventually play the hostage card against Harry.

Of course he would have been suspicious of what motivated Thomas, but he had no time for an investigation.  Lara would have insisted on that had they all survived the attack.  I don't think the bread crumbs would lead all that easily back to Justine.. She'd also have time to get her act together and Lara would have been even more protective of her, remember she never saw through her.

Lara never saw through Justine's ruse in what 48 hours?  Less?  When the supernatural world was exploding all around her.  I have confidence that given time, Lara would have come to the same conclusions as Harry did on the boat.  He did learn about the pregnancy significantly earlier than she did.  More investigation wasn't needed.  Time to think was what was missing.  Sending Thomas off may not have been a 100% chance of outing Justine, but it was more likely than not going to do so.